I didn’t enjoy the screen printing workshop at all for this project, this was due to the idea’s that I lacked. My fonts we’re too fancy for my ‘horror/edgy’ theme, they didn’t look anything like my sample fonts previously practiced and they didn’t sit well on the background images. Never mind the struggle of using newspaper to block the paint.. However, strangely the smudge marks left on the page from the paint caught my appeal and completely changed my concept. There was something more appealing about the messy texture left behind. Maybe instead of creating fonts to print on the image, I could create the image from the mark makings..

(Here are 2x samples of my ‘best’ screen prints.) I will not be pushing these samples any further, instead I plan to move away from screen printing on to Mono printing – A slightly more controlled yet messier technique. Just saying that excites me!

I wasn’t having the best of days in the print room as I moved on to Monoprint. I layered the paint too thick on the surface to print which left me with several pages of black paint with no visible sign of any illustrations. After many samples, I managed to fade away a lot of paint – time to create!

It was difficult not to lean on the paper with some of my drawings due to the detail that I had put into them. So I moved off illustrating my images and instead focused on scratching away some fonts.

To start off idea’s I began to search the locations he speaks of in Southampton. I struggled to see his bitterness, as photos of the bay flooded my screen along side colourful images of the sunset over the sea…

He speaks of how a shopping centre stretches as big as a small town! I found images on the 28DL site of the Bargate Shopping Centre – It stands in the centre surrounded by small business shops that look just as beat down as – the shopping centre that stands untouched for years.

I created a mind map of the objects that gather around Bargate, mainly focusing around the emptiness left behind. It’s a mixture of magazine collage, drawing and photography. This made the task of translating his narrative easier as I could see for myself what he speaks of.

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]]>https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/12/13/authorreporter/feed/0imag2952rebeccadcapewellAuthor:Reporter – Collage Workshophttps://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/12/13/authorreporter-collage-workshop/
https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/12/13/authorreporter-collage-workshop/#respondTue, 13 Dec 2016 15:55:22 +0000http://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/?p=1032Continue reading Author:Reporter – Collage Workshop]]>For the first collage workshop – I started off with sampling a few of the written narratives. I found images in magazines and newspapers and manipulated them to create stories that create an instant impact.

This exercise helped me to explore the text and build a storyboard limiting me to mould images into an illustrative as to freely sketching out my storyboard. Although.. I defiantly got carried away telling the story from the images rather than focusing them on their specific location (Southampton).

Telling a story with image and text.

WYIWYG – What You see Is What You Get Rero’s slogan/tag. “For this project, Rero uses a minimalist typography with deletion on a simple white background. Context is essential to grasp the essence of the work, as seen on the streets of Berlin, Paris and London” (Rero)

Rero is a French graffiti artist who classes himself as a conceptual artist with a graffiti background. He refers to his work as minimalistic/simple style. Image negation.

(Images from Rero’s blog.)

Because Rero work is so striking, eyes are drawn to his unique style. So striking that companies such as ‘Nike’ approached him to work on their big campaigns. Rero’s response was surprising impressive “People complain about the evolution of graffiti or of street art, about it being taken over by the media or commercialism, but us artists, we are the first one’s who are responsible. You have to know when to say no, how to control your art, the image it conveys, and the money that it can generate at our expense and at the expense of others”

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]]>https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/12/13/authorreporter-inspired-artist/feed/0imag2950rebeccadcapewellartworkdesbanalitesnosubstance-installationexterieure-2011notfound-installationdansuneegliseabandonnee-2011How well do you know an artist?https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/how-well-do-you-know-an-artist/
https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/how-well-do-you-know-an-artist/#respondThu, 13 Oct 2016 18:24:45 +0000http://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/?p=982Continue reading How well do you know an artist?]]>Designer in the making ‘Sfiink’ invites you to take a dive into her life as a growing creator in the big city of London. It’s her first week back in year 2 at London Metropolitan University and she looks eager to explode with answers.. So let me waste no more time..

As I was snooping around your social media, I stumbled across the name ‘Sfiink’ – Should I refer to you as this as I interview you about your work?

Haha please call me Sam, do refer to me as my name. I go by the name Sfiink more online.

Would you say its more of an online identity rather than your personal name, or would you like to be recognised as Sfiink the artist?

I mean I’m totally fine with people knowing me by my first name, but when you view art work – lets say – in the Tate Modern gallery it’s interesting to come across a one word name that has no character/identity behind it. I feel it creates curiosity for the viewer, I want them to view my work and get a buzz from the flow and expression I explode my work with.. I want to lure their attention all on Sfiink – the name gives little away, I want them to question me as an artist, who is it?

Also… I really don’t fancy my nan searching my nan searching my name, she’ll have a shock to find my weird art…. (We both break out in laughter, “I reckon we all carry that fear, I don’t think I could ever have the courage to show my family my ‘real’ art work…)

How would you describe your personality in your work? I noticed a lot of female focused sketches that touch a lot around their beauty..

I began my journey in the creative world at a young age as I watched a hell of a lot of cartoons such as Pokemon etc, my attention was always drawn to the female characters though, how elegantly designed they appear, their outfits! Ah it’s all so good, I love the connection I felt between the artist and their creation and thought let’s embrace it!

But don’t let the cartoons take all the limelight as my interest grew in my studies as a A level student. I became more observant on new techniques I was learning at the time, my favourite technique to use is traditional oil painting – it is my main technique when I’m in my creative element.

(Photography: Sam Friend)

Tell me about your perspective on the world, would you say you interpret your surroundings into your work?

I definitely would like to say I live more in a fantasy world, I can thank cartoons for this… So when I was younger (preschool age) I used to imagine cartoon characters casually strolling around the playground, like it was their world. To me that was normal life and it certainly made my childhood creative. Now that I’m older (haha) I’m mostly intrigued by the world and nature. We live in a beautiful world, the real world – I mean plants, forests, landscapes ah I love it, it can be refreshing to work with!

But don’t be fooled by the prettiness of my work as I love adding secrets… if you have the eye to seek deeper into my work, you have the eye to discover my hidden messages. I like adding secrets that appear ‘normal’ at a couple of glances. Take a look at this sketch for instance. (Sam whips out her sketchbook and flicks through the pages) these sketches are for the month of October aka Inktober, ah and here it is! (She allows me a brief glance) Do you see? It’s all dark and gloomy right? But look here, there’s a cute figure right here… (Sam points out this small, adorable little teddy bear centre staged in the page that is discreetly hidden by the darkness of her sketch) now look at this one, (flicking the page to quite an opposite drawing, this time the sketch appears innocuous as a child eats his plate of spaghetti) this one is pure and innocent, do you see it? (I screw my eyes up searching… Oh.. damn! That’s dark) Unexpected isn’t it? Haha I like putting dark messages into my sketches, but don’t get me wrong I like to switch it up and flip the style vice versa.

Let’s move on to your interests in the design world. Who are you hugely inspired by in the industry? Do you carry a desire to follow their footsteps and branch high?

When I seriously think about myself as a designer, I don’t imagine myself all high and mighty in the scene, neither do I want the attention. I like to picture myself as a small business where I create my own path and enjoy the quiet life of designing. I’m not interested in being big as fame is something that certainly scares me, I mean imagine designers such as Tim Burton… Yer he’s living the life of life however I can imagine it to be a huge strain when it comes down to him and his pen. Now I get a job needs status, I get that but if I was to take that amount of status on my shoulders I definitely would collapse under pressure. I want to take pride in my artwork as I explode the page with passion and enjoyment, I don’t want a status to quickly take that away from me.

Thank you for your time Sam!

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]]>https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/how-well-do-you-know-an-artist/feed/0rebeccadcapewellscreen-shot-2016-10-13-at-19-02-27screen-shot-2016-10-13-at-19-01-09screen-shot-2016-10-13-at-19-02-48A peek into the office of Four Corners Books.https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/a-peek-into-the-office-of-four-corners-books/
https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/a-peek-into-the-office-of-four-corners-books/#respondThu, 13 Oct 2016 17:55:52 +0000http://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/?p=961Continue reading A peek into the office of Four Corners Books.]]>If your anything like me, remembering you’re left and your right is a struggle..so looking for a specific place is a nightmare. So imagine my struggle looking for the building that Four Corners Books is located in. Luckily for me, I followed my peers through Shoreditch, venturing through little passages that were overshadowed by structures before we finally had arrived at this rather discreet building. I started the previous sentence with lucky… because I would never had thought that this was the location of Four Corners books. I say this because the building gives nothing away at all! No sign… no number… no posters or any information that indicates that this is the correct location.

I am quick to learn that they are in a room that is underneath the roof ofa grade A listed building which comes with very restricted rulings. This explains why all the walls are bare and why there is no information sign that hangs on the outer-side. For me as an illustrator, I find hanging my work on pieces of string dotted all over the walls is a great way for me to visually focus on my current/past designs. I am informed that no design actually takes place under the roof of the office and that it’s mostly planning that buries the large table that centres the room.

Four Corner books are made up of a team of two who work hand in hand in their office perched on the 3rd floor. Although the room is spacious and a focused working environment, it’s redeemed just as important to explore other places in person rather than behind a desk as it drives creativity. This enables the team of two to explore what is already on the market around the UK.

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]]>https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/a-peek-into-the-office-of-four-corners-books/feed/0imag2312rebeccadcapewellCollect, Analyse and Re-assemble.https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/collect-analyse-and-re-assemble/
https://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/collect-analyse-and-re-assemble/#respondTue, 10 May 2016 05:14:42 +0000http://rebeccacapewellblog.wordpress.com/?p=868Continue reading Collect, Analyse and Re-assemble.]]>For this project I am required to create an artist book from my reassembled collection. For me to create and understand a collection, I first must explore the system of them, what organises them into categories?

I flicked between collecting notes and collecting dreams, collecting notes carried the excitement of piecing together random words assembling them as collection. However dreams had more of a personal connection, which can be manipulated in many ways. (Dream’s slightly difficult to sometimes capture).

Helga Stepphan – Hot House Talk

Helga Steppan lead a hot house talk that inspired me to look deeper into reassembling a collection – being creative. The image above seems normal, nothing that stands out as odd. Helga went on to explain that in fact one of these trees is in fact an aerial (phone line connection).

This pushed me to think about a collection – exploring the depths of what a collection can be? How to manipulate something that acts as something…

Tim Burton – Vincent.

“Why spend your time making someone else’s dream?” Tim Burton’s playful horror approach influenced me to explore my dreams, as they are just a collection of scenes in the mind that sometimes are vivid to try to understand. What if I changed my note taking into dream collecting – transferring visions into notes – from notes to something visual possibly touchable.

Other artists work that inspired me:

My final outcome was far to explorative in my head, in reality looked more like an explosion of objects that was more a collection of personal objects instead of stories that lead to vivid 2D/3D images. For this project, I wanted to explore a new area of design, playing physical objects instead of drawing/collage. However, my mind swept more to Tracey Emin’s Bed – rather than Tim Burton’s dream style.

As my installation turned out looking more like a clutter of mess rather than an entrance to my mind I decided to create something more down to earth ‘book’ rather than a temporary installation. So I re-designed my sketchbook as my book ‘Collect, Analyse and Re-assemble’. My sketchbook is a collection of my thoughts and idea’s that can assembled to create a lamp shade that will project my collected dreams and thoughts.

This was an exercise to shake the brain and process idea’s – exploring new quick techniques. A word was said, the first thing that to came to my mind, I crammed within 30 seconds. The 100 drawings was nice to reflect back to as I had no time to go into depths for an idea, drawing random things that had some relation to the word.

When I struggled to find an idea to sketch down, I flicked back to the 100 sketches that are raw and untouched due the pet hate of detailed thought about sketches. Instead of touching them up, I began to set myself tasks similar to the 100 words brief – most of my illustrations related to my cartoon characters. This is to help me form new idea’s… which worked. What started off as 2/5minute rough sketches, turned into neat pieces.

This was an exciting workshop, after this lesson I found myself noticing how layouts have been played with n articles to draw the viewers attention etc. Coming to grips with the computer software was difficult, however my final spread was pretty impressive and worth the hustle an struggle. Below are some images that display explain day’s my process.

Photographic Typologies workshop.

After Ricardo’s workshop on layout and displaying, I went on to learn some basics with Heather on typology. From this workshop, I created a A4 – 5 page spread of photo’s that was told in a typology story for the Vice magazine.

Carrying on the information that I was taught in the spread workshop, I focused on the presentation that was appealing and catchy.

This was a task which tested my ability to tell a story with a camera instead of a pen, I was able to enjoy the laying out of the spread more as I worked with my hands, crafting my idea’s rather than on the computer.

Typographic Infographics

This workshop gave me an insight into the graphics world, there’s a lot more to each letter/word/sentence that creates the whole message that meets the eye. I spent the morning researching the meaning of typography and their acts in graphics. In the afternoon, I then went on to create pages of illustrated images that explain each term that would make sense to somebody else learning typography.

By spending the morning looking into the designs of the graphics, how they are used and the use of them made it easier for me to commute my simple understanding through writing about them to then go on to create an explanation through illustrations. I then went on to the father of type – letterpress. A very fun exercise and great sense of environment. I had to put to use my research in the workshop, looking at how to construct a sentance by hand. From the induction I printed some signs that experimented with colour, size, shape.

I was impressed with my samples, I loved how the ink when running out left faint letters, all marked individually due to being man handled.

Mono Printing workshop.

A broad view of the city of London, it’s impossible to see the horizon because of the buildings, but they build their own skyline. For my brief, I had to create 5 images that explore different mark making techniques. I spent a few minutes sketching the skyline, soaking in the blocks out of colour, layout shadows etc… My first attempt at printing I used masking tape and and cardboard cuttings . The sample (above) did not gather as much ink as planned, however had a rather different effect than expected which was an exciting outcome.

I was then reminded of the square trick, which saved a lot of my pieces being thrown away. It was a useful technique to highlight the best area’s to focus and expand from.

Above are different samples that I had created.

A Mask Story.

For this workshop I had to work as part of a team to create 2x 3D masks of choice that will worn by members of the group to create a storyboard out of the freeze frame sketches to build from. The task was challenging as there was a lot of detail to try and inflict into my board. By the end of the workshop, I managed to create a skeleton to build on for design idea’s to create an illustrated story from the masks created.

A mixture of sketches inspired by everyday living

Drawing exercise, focused on the movement of the body. As well as mixtures of drawings from my travel.

Stop Motion Animation

My brief requires me to create a short animation that works as a loop. For me to be able to create my own anima, I need to explore different methods and processes through watching varies of animations. Hilary by Anthony Hodgson was my inspiration for my stop motion. While watching his animation several times, I took notes, focusing on the story being told, as a viewer – looking at what connects my attention to the setting. I began discovering idea’s – I began exploring how the camera fixed on certain characters I am able to see what works, and what doesn’t as well as what matters to the audience.